This invention relates to an improvement in the process for producing glass beads described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,843,340 to Eugene J. Cone, entitled "Method and Apparatus for Producing Glass Beads." In that process, glass is melted to a low viscosity and forced through a small-diameter orifice to form a jet which breaks apart into beads as it falls through air. Because it would require an impractical falling distance through air for the glass beads to cool sufficiently to solidify, the beads are caught in a bath of liquid quenching medium after a drop of a few meters or less. As the still-soft beads contact the surface of the quenching liquid, however, there is usually sufficient impact force to flatten the beads somewhat. The resultant lack of spherical regularity in the beads can be objectionable in connection with some end uses for the beads.
Attempts to reduce the impact force on the beads as they enter the quenching liquid by reducing the viscosity of the liquid or by further shortening the drop height have failed to eliminate flattening of the beads, and in some cases have unexpectedly made flatter beads. Thus it would be desirable if some means were available for catching molten glass beads within a practical drop height which would yield substantially spherical beads.